The Walking Dead: Better Angels
by Fanfiction of the Dead
Summary: On the night that Shane plotted to kill his best friend, everything changed. From there, the group is pointed in the direction of a prison that could become their safe haven, but for that to be so, they're going to have to fight for it. Being re-written eventually.
1. Chapter 1

_The views expressed in this story do not reflect the views of this author or _The Walking Dead_ creators. This is a re-imagining of the second season of AMC's _The Walking Dead_. There are scenes of violence, gore, and otherwise disturbing subject material. If you are interested enough to be reading or writing fan fiction about a zombie apocalypse, you probably already know this._

**THE WALKING DEAD - BETTER ANGELS**

Cold as a corpse, the night begged for murder and Shane Walsh humored it.

Holding his best friend at gunpoint, the malefactor marveled at how well his plan had gone considering how the odds were stacked against him. Dale, Randall, Lori - he was especially worried that a tracker like Daryl with a scary record for picking up tiny details would discover his treachery. But none of that mattered, now that the son of a bitch who'd come back from the dead was in his sights. This time nobody was around to stop him or notice him. No one around to report him to the others, send the group into a panic. _Rick got bit by a walker_, he'd say, _Had to put him down_.

Rick was already a shadow of his former self. The only two, maybe three people who could see that were Shane, Lori, of course, and his son, Carl. Shane noticed that the boy was noticing his father's irresponsible actions more and more. Carl wasn't just a little boy who needed to be protected by his mother anymore. He couldn't be that little boy anymore, not after getting shot as a result of Rick's carelessness. That only made Shane angrier.

Angrier still when Rick finally drew his sidearm. Balls for doing it while he still had a gun pointed at him, but shit-for-brains when he twirled the gun around, promising that he would die unarmed, helpless.

Shane tightened his grip on his sidearm, sensing that there was foul play at work here. Rick was a clever son of a bitch, he had to give him that. No way he'd just turn his gun over, acting this nonchalant over dying, losing his chance at Carl and Lori. Shane was able to leave men for dead, or snap a kid's neck when the safety of the group and his family demanded it, but killing a completely unarmed acquaintance made his stomach turn.

Rick slowly approached him, spewing hollow words and promises that they could still make amends after all this.

Each word patted the deranged man's shoulder, telling him that things would be all right and that his death threat would go unpunished. Soon Rick was barely four feet away from him, holding his sidearm so that Shane could grab it from him.

He almost did, but as his hand went for Rick's gun, Shane saw an image of Lori from after one of their trysts. She whispered her love to him and vanished. His swollen eye twitched. Rick noticed this and started for the knife at his side. Shane noticed this as well, and threw his arms up, backpedaling in time to avoid the cold swipe Rick attempted.

Shane had survived this close encounter, but his former friend and partner was far from finished. Rick dove after him, knife ready, and Shane's only protection was a jacket and good fortune. The two bodies collided and tangled, miraculously avoiding fatal paths as they exchanged blows. Two gunshots spilled into the night and the fight resumed, taking a toll on what little remained of either man's sanity.

Obviously, a victor was decided. Unlike the way Hollywood portrayed it, men suffer from the same mortality as everyone else in a fistfight.

The man lacking a fatal injury rose, a gun in his hand, a knife in the other. The moonlight revealed bloody, wounded features that now rested on the man's face. Shane gathered the spit from his throat and tossed it to the ground, barely an inch away from his fallen partner's face. The man he'd respected, fought alongside of, shared most of his secrets with lay there, shivering as his last breaths escaped him. Shane had gotten lucky. The knife Rick drew had come this close to piercing him through the heart, but for all may have been the wind itself leading Rick's arm astray, the knife skidded lightly across his chest and given him the time to club the side of Rick's head, stunning him. Long enough for Shane to take aim, curse Rick's name and existence, and fire. The bullet surged through the air and into Rick's heart, ending his resistance once and for all.

_Rick got bit by a walker. Had to put him down._

Rage condensing, Shane pointed his handgun at the top of Rick's corpse and squeezed the trigger. The bullet blew away a good portion of Rick's scalp, indicating the man died prior to becoming a Walker. If the head is destroyed, the Walker dies instantly despite all evidence to the contrary. However, becoming a Walker first involved getting bitten in the first place. Shane bit his lip hard until thin lines of blood emerged. This plan was beyond disgusting, but necessary.

He leaned hesitantly, then knelt down so that he couldn't see the hollowed, lifeless eyes that were looking back at him, screaming "You killed me! You did this!" in pained tones. If Rick, a seasoned police officer, was caught off-guard in a Walker attack, Shane knew it would have to have been a severe Walker attack to pin good ol' Rick down.

Glaring at the corpse, Shane held his breath and took a large bite into Rick's face, chewing into his cheek so that the wound was deep and garish. As he finished creating a cheek wound, he spit out the fleshy leftovers and reeled. How on god's green earth Walkers could hunt and digest human flesh like that was a question he never wanted to hear the answer to.

The urge to vomit wrestled with his survival instinct as Shane took Rick's knife and drove it into his dead friend's shoulder, carving a miniature Texas and wedging it free from the rest of the skin. Tossing this piece away too, Shane's exhibit was now a believable cover story for a well-planned murder. Two deep bite wounds, the brain destroyed or damaged to prevent reanimation, and enough time and space for him to recover and forge his story.

"Fuck you Rick." he mumbled, suddenly shouting, "FUCK YOU RICK. _FUCK_ _YOU_!" not caring who heard or saw him.

Years he could have been fucking Lori. Years she could have been sucking his dick. All those years he spent banging girl after girl were squandered when Rick married Lori, had a son with her, and kept on living the good life. Shane had just started to get those years back when Rick bit the farm on the day everything changed. The day that he first held Lori in his arms, unable to say whether his best friend was alive or dead, most likely the former. All it took was for that son of a bitch to have a lucky second wind for him to come and find them through the fucking apocalypse, weeks after they'd moved away, for everything to come crashing down on Shane.

Cold-blooded as this whole night may have seemed, this was what was right. This was the way things needed to be. Lori and Carl would need time to mourn, any human being would. But both had already lost Rick once; the only difference was that this time, Shane assured himself that Rick was gone for good.

"Dad?" a voice called out from the darkness of Hershel's farm.

In his short-lived revelry of murdering Rick, Shane took baby steps down the hill in a direction opposite the direction Daryl and Glenn had gone. He spotted the small form that was running over to Rick's corpse, regretting instantly that he'd left Rick there and intercepting the boy with a tackle. Carl cried as Shane restrained him, obstructing the boy's dead father from his line of sight. "Stop it Carl!" he shouted, face covered in sweat. "What the hell are you doing here!?"

"My dad! He's... he's...!" the boy stuttered on these words and never seemed to connect Shane's battered appearance with his father's corpse, sitting there in the moonlight in biblical poise.

Keeping the boy from getting a closer look was easy even in his panicked state, and the weary police officer maintained a strong grip on him as Carl's cries worsened. He twisted Carl around so that his face was obscured, hiding the dark satisfaction that tainted his lips. With Rick permanently out of his way, Shane didn't have to oblige Lori's selfish requests anymore. He was the only one of Carl's father figures still alive, so whether she liked it or not, she needed him to fill the void in what remained of their family.

Sooner or later, he'd win Lori back too. For now, all he needed to do was sob and keep Carl ignorant of his father's true fate.

That was the first problem Shane Walsh found in his plan. No matter how hard he tried, the tears for Rick Grimes wouldn't come to him. Even as he looked Carl Grimes, soon to be his adopted son, straight in the eyes and saw the boy's fleeting despair drain from his face, Shane felt no amount of sorrow enter or leave him. To keep up this charade, he needed to show more emotion than he did with Otis or Randall. Dale had detected the first lie from the way Shane acted, and Rick, moments before his death, apparently knew that his best friend had killed in cold blood before and planned to do so again.

In order for him to cry, Shane focused his mind on Lori - her being eaten by a Walker, but not just any Walker. No, this Walker was specifically-crafted to awaken the humanity that rested within him. The Walker eating Lori from the innards of her womb was none other than the baby he had given her. The baby, somehow, had died and come back as a Walker and instinctively began consuming its mother while she was still conscious. The horror was enough to wedge those few genuine tears from his face, elevating his performance as he sobbed along with Carl, pretending that these were pains drawn from having to shoot his best friend to save him from becoming a Walker.

Together, Shane explained the reason why Rick was laying there to his son as sympathetically as he could. Carl was a strong boy, and in-between his cries, he staggered over to his father's corpse with hatred burning inside him. Shane gazed off into the darkness ahead of them, putting his hand in front of Carl before he got too close. The second problem in Shane Walsh's plan was easy to spot from here.

A herd of Walkers, numbering in what had to be hundreds, was swiftly converging on them.


	2. Chapter 2

_So yes, this is an AU about Shane being the victor in his battle with Rick at the end of Season 2. By a stroke of luck, Rick dies and Shane manages to clear himself in time for a good ol-fashioned Walker invasion._

_The views expressed in this story do not reflect the views of this author or _The Walking Dead_ creators. This is a re-imagining of the second season of AMC's _The Walking Dead_. _

**BETTER ANGELS - PART TWO**

Run, Shane thought, ushering his son to the safety of the farm to the south. If he had to take on a hundred Walkers all by himself to protect Carl and Lori, he'd have done it. But add another four hundred to that and Shane accepted just how hopelessly outnumbered he was. He checked his gun as he urged Carl to sprint faster. His Glock 17 had only fired four rounds including the one that "destroyed Rick's brain". Then there was Rick's gun which Rick had chosen not to fire, so that one still had a full clip. Whatever extra ammo he might have had on his person, Shane was too preoccupied with putting distance between them and the mass of shadows emerging from the night to check.

Had a couple of shots really attracted so many of _them_? How the fuck is that even possible, Shane's mind raced, Fucking Rick, all he ever does is bring trouble into town!

* * *

Shit, Daryl scowled when he and Glenn returned to Hershel's house, Shane's been screwing with us.

The walk back from the woods where Shane had gotten "jumped" by Randall was an excruciating one, laced with questions and paranoia that the hunter couldn't answer. He had been content to stomach Shane's deceit so long as it meant there was an extra gun protecting the camp, the farm, or whatever place they happened to call 'home' these days. Shane had led their group for a short time, before Rick stepped in and took over, and Shane had led them toward Atlanta, toward guns, toward security and stability. The worst Daryl ever picked up on was Shane sacrificing Otis, but even that was to bring back the respirator that Hershel needed to save Carl's life.

Their hunt for Randall was a failure, but Daryl knew why. The tracks he'd found were too close for Randall to have snuck up on Shane, and Shane definitely wasn't a hunter so it probably wasn't the vice-versa. To top things off, Randall's neck was broken, turning into a Walker just in time for them to run into him. There wasn't a bite on the boy's neck. Maybe they should have checked longer; it was dark after all, and the blood from the machete wound might have smeared any bite marks, but still, the whole thing was giving Daryl a headache.

When they heard the gunshot back in the direction of the farm, Daryl and Glenn rushed back there and walked inside where everything looked somber, but normal. Daryl and Glenn relayed the news to everybody. Rick and Shane were no-shows, and for some reason, Carl wasn't standing by his mother in the living room. Despite this observation, Lori approached Daryl with a worried look on her face.

Her concern was elsewhere, "Would you please get back out there and find Shane and Rick and find out what the hell is going on?"

The gravity of this situation made Daryl nod to her compliantly. He sure as hell wanted some explanations for all of this too.

Explanations would have to wait of course, judging from all the howling coming from outside. Daryl followed the others onto Hershel's porch. There was a horde lingering around the farm. He hadn't seen a number this huge since Atlanta, and that was during the daytime. No telling from what corner of the world these freaks turned up from.

* * *

Shane Walsh and Carl Grimes ran for their lives from the walking dead.

Walkers in packs were dangerous in close combat, and a horde of Walkers at night was ten times worse. Shane saw only one way out toward the barn. Somehow, their retreat was being blocked as Walkers slowly enveloped the farm. Running towards the barn and barricading themselves inside it was the best available course. Carl wanted to warn the others, but Shane shot the idea down at the sight of a conga line of Walkers surrounding Hershel's house.

"This way!" Shane ordered, pointing at the barn where Hershel had kept a stock of Walkers not long ago. The irony was sweeter than the odor.

Inside, the barn was rusted and old. Stable, strong enough to wall in over a dozen Walkers and some chickens. Farm equipment decorated the stables, unused for obvious reasons. There was a clicking sound when Shane slid the lock on the barn door, followed by a hurricane of hungry moans and gunshots. Hershel's family and the rest must have been out there already, fending off the invasion. Shane had counted the guns and ammunition himself; they could burn through all of it and still not put a dent in this horde. Fortunately, there were two things sitting inside this barn that could.

"Carl, give me a hand!"

There were cars far-off in the distance and the gunshots started getting louder and closer. For a moment, Shane felt like he was being abandoned, betrayed by the group for killing their leader. It would have been impossible for anyone else except for Carl and himself to know of Rick's demise. There was nothing to fear, nothing except for the way the barn walls rattled. His plan could still work out in the end.

Carl was finished with his gasoline can at the same time as him, so Shane tossed their cans away and guided Carl up the stairs. Reassuring the frightened lad of his plan, Shane told him to head up the ladder while he dealt with their Walker problem. He sprinted over to the barn doors, unlocked them, then pounded on the doors a few times to gain attention. The doors were pushed in by nine or more hands, all reaching for human flesh.

"Come on, you want _this_!? You want _this_!?" he chided them, begging the monsters closer. "Come and _get_ it!" He drew his Glock and put two rounds through two of them. His vision blurred with rage, but he kept goading the Walkers further and further into the barn, scurrying up the ladder as they cornered him, until the barn was flooded with Walkers.

A lighter fell from the darkness, hitting the floor through the sheer number of Walkers.

Underneath the Walkers lay a slick of gasoline, now burning brighter than before. The trap he and Carl had set ignited, sending a furious beacon of light all across the farm, a message to retreat.

* * *

Walkers bloomed across the farm. A fire raged within the barn where Glenn found all those Walkers and later Sophia. Daryl scoped the area, taking pot shots now and then to ward off any monster that came too close.

Once he'd picked a path, he drove through the howls, groans, and screams until he was a safe distance away. It was hard enough finding a safe spot to shoot from; darkness covered the farm. Hershel's daughter made sure to turn off the lights so as not to attract any Walkers from the herd, so the only lights out here were the farm, Daryl's headlight, and the faint taillights of Dale's RV.

In the front seat was Jimmy, putting down three more Walkers all by himself. Refusing to be outdone, Daryl bagged another three before he rode up to the side of the RV. "Must of been Rick or Shane that started that fire, maybe they're trying to get around out back!" he shouted, remembering how terrified Lori was to see that Rick and Shane weren't back yet.

Jimmy complied and took off towards the farm in the RV. Daryl drove back to the house and followed the dirt road away from the farm. He was running out of bullets and the horde wasn't letting up anytime soon. Driving away from the raging fire, there were two pools of Walkers near the side of the barn, right where the RV was, and another pool that was next to a blue truck. Both were probably feeding... he didn't want to know who.

Atop a grassy grade thinly cradled in moonlight, Daryl slowed and watched the flames grow higher, seizing the night.

A woman's voice pulled his attention away from the ruined sanctuary to a fence that led to the outside. There he saw a defenseless Carol running into the darkness, pursued by a squad of Walkers.

This farm was obviously lost, so Rick and Shane would probably lead the others back to the highway. Daryl snorted as he drove towards Carol. "Come on, we ain't got all day!"

The widowed mother deliriously latched onto him with more speed than he knew she had. She urged him, "Go! Go!" and he obliged.

They got away from the farm in less than a minute.

* * *

"GET OVER HERE!" Shane thundered, waving over the driver of the RV to come and pick them up.

They'd gotten here in the nick of the time. Escaping from the lower part of the barn was impossible, and just as soon as the fire started, more Walkers surrounded the barn as if they expected for two human meals to have an ultimatum: burn to death, or jump down and be eaten alive.

He watched Carl pick off a couple of Walkers then pulled him forward to the edge of the barn's roof. Shane went first, then helped Carl hop to the roof of the RV. Shane knelt down, banging and yelling at the RV's current driver to let them know that they were safely onboard. The only response he received were the ravenous cries from the mass of Walkers below.

Things went from bad to worse; Carl had used most of his rounds sniping at Walkers in the darkness, and Shane kept Rick's revolver hidden, a testament to his guilt. If they didn't move soon, more Walkers would surround the RV, blocking their escape the same way the Walkers around the barn did. He tried to open the RV's roof hatch, but the hatch was locked for some reason.

The air thick with rot, lucky were they that the hatch was opened from below - Jimmy, the boy who lived with Hershel's family, hurried with them into the RV, slamming the hatch shut.

Inside the RV, a mist of hands reached through the unlocked doors.

'Course, the hatch is locked and the doors aren't, Shane cursed, pulling Rick's gun from his jacket to knock back an unlucky Walker. The body limped and stalled the Walkers trying to break in, but not for long. Shane started to say they should climb back up and look for another way out, just as a gunshot came from behind him. He spun around, catching Carl with his gun aimed at one of the RV's windows. Carl fired again, shooting out another window in the back area. Shane smiled, impressed by his son's ingenuity, then took one of the pillows from the back area and cleared some of the glass from the broken window.

He handed Jimmy the revolver that Rick carried, "Here, you've got four shots, make'em count kid. Stick with us!" accepting it, Jimmy nodded and stood back.

Shane climbed through the broken window first, checking their surroundings before he helped Carl exit from the same window. Jimmy struggled getting out of the other window as a mass of hands scratched at him, having found their way past Shane's blockade and into the den of the RV. He landed on his knees, but nothing had taken a bite out of him so he was no worse for wear. The trio fled into the darkness together.

"Carl, where's the last place you saw your mom?" asked Shane.

"She... she was in the house!" The boy answered.

Following the dirt trails north would bring them back to Hershel's house, hopefully to Lori and the others. Jimmy suggested they head east, find another car or some of the horses and high-tail it. He was alone on this of course.

Shane and Carl both demanded to know about Lori's location, so Jimmy opted to find a car and come back from them while they searched. There were three cars circling around the farm, pecking at the herd of Walkers. One of them, a blue truck, turned around and raced away from the barn. The truck drove around the opposite side of Hershel's house and missed Shane and Carl completely.

There were a few more gunshots ringing from the front porch of the house. It sounded like somebody firing a shotgun, apparently without even needing to reload. Shane searched the exterior of the house, spotting the lone figure firing with professional skill into oncoming Walkers. Hershel, the son of a bitch, was a damn good shot it seemed. Shane kept Carl close as they witnessed Hershel strafe backward, finally pulling some extra shells from his pocket. A Walker drew closer to Hershel, still focused on what lay before him: a burning farm and the very monsters responsible for all his misery in the past few weeks... well, most of it. If not for Carl's presence, Shane briefly considered leaving Hershel to his fate.

Hershel whirled around when the head of a Walker exploded right behind him. Shane and him locked eyes, but their hostility was matched by their desperation.

"Have you seen Lori!?" yelled Shane.

"I haven't." Hershel said, breaking the line of sight so he could take another shot at a Walker.

"Don't screw with me Hershel, have you seen her? Where's Glenn, Daryl, the rest of them!? What the hell's going on!?"

"I don't know what happened!" Hershel shouted. "They just keep coming, it's like a plague! Where's Rick!? Did you find that boy!?"

"No time for that!" Shane opened fire, dropping a Walker with his Glock's last round. "We're going to find the others! Move your ass Hershel!"

"You might have ruined my farm, but you're _not_ spiriting me off of it." Hershel growled.

"Now is not the time-!"

"Go! Go find your family so you can stop slaughtering _mine_!"

Hershel had a death wish. Shane wasn't above granting an old man, the old man who pissed him off only slightly less than Dale his final wish, but he couldn't. Not with Lori expecting a baby. They needed a doctor, any doctor, and they'd have to settle with a veterinarian if need be. As much as it irked him, Shane needed Hershel alive. He grabbed the old man by his suspenders, tugging him towards the car.

"Let go of me!" Hershel almost took a swing at him with his shotgun, stopping only because Shane let go.

"You want to die old man?" Shane asked, sweat pouring down his face.

"IT'S MY FARM!"

"Look Hershel, the group needs you, _your family_ needs _you_! This farm? Ha, this farm's gone! Over! Wake up and face the truth!"

This seemed to stifle the old doctor enough for Shane to lead them to a station wagon parked nearby. Carl looked and pointed into the darkness as a shadow sprinted for them, a bag jiggling at the person's waist.

* * *

Elsewhere, only moments before, figures ran away from the silo. Carol and Andrea, pursued by a fresh wave of Walkers.

Andrea had gotten pinned underneath a Walker that tried to jump her. By the time she pushed the monster from her, Carol, T-Dog, and Lori had disappeared. It was too dark to see where she was going except for where the barn glowed like a funeral pyre. A couple of taillights swam through the night far-off from Hershel's land. Everyone was gone, they'd left her behind. Immediately, she went for her gun, but it had fallen when the Walker fell on her. Walkers circled her, but through the bleak setting Andrea's eyes spied the bag of guns that Rick had brought to the group sitting in the moonlight. She dove for them, snatching the bag on her wrist, whipping out the first handgun she could grab.

Shooting her way through this catastrophe was futile. All of the ammunition in the world wouldn't have helped her now. She blew away several Walkers, running back toward the house, hoping to at least find shelter. As she did, she noticed Hershel standing near the silo, blasting away Walkers with his shotgun, vigilant. She started to run towards him, but a Walker tried to clip her. She backpedaled, blasting the monster's face to smithereens.

But when she searched for Hershel again, the old doctor was gone.

Red lights peered at her through the darkness. The havoc around the farm, shadows shuffling along the grass drawn by unseen forces, was disrupted only by the noise of the final getaway vehicle speeding off into the night. The Walkers heard the engine. Dozens were summoned by it, hobbling in Andrea's direction while she drew her handgun in defense.


End file.
